In 1972, while the world's gaze was fixed on Iceland, a company in America had plans to generate publicity for itself through the chess world. Church's Fried Chicken, a restaurant chain in the United States, organized an international tournament to be held in San Antonio, Texas. European and Soviet grandmasters were pitted against grandmasters and masters from the Americas in a round robin format. The sixteen participants were (in order of Elo rating): Tigran Petrosian (2645), Lajos Portisch (2640), Anatoli Karpov (2630), Bent Larsen (2625), Vlastimil Hort (2600), Paul Keres (2600), Svetozar Gligoric (2575), Henrique Mecking (2570), Larry Evans (2545), Walter Shawn Browne (2530), Donald Byrne (2470), Julio Kaplan (2470), Duncan Suttles (2470), Dr. Anthony Saidy (2425), Ken Smith (2395), and Mario Campos Lopez (2200). The tournament ended with the top three seeds sharing first place.

SChesshevsky: < EdZelli: I wish we could get some sponsorships like the old days. Lots of good players in the south ie. San Anton, Dallas, Houston etc.>

Fischermania can probably be thanked for this tourney and his retirement can probably be thanked for the lack of interest by sponsors since.

I believe the idea of the 72 event came up from a suggestion by a GM or USCF official, I forget which, when having dinner with the Church's. Of course, it was hoped Fischer would show and if I remember right he did but only as a spectator for a very short time.

SteinitzLives: What a glorious window of chess sponsorship opportunity was open but for such a brief moment thanks to the Fischer boom. A shame organizers and Fischer himself could not or would not jump in to get more sponsors to participate, and bring big money to chess.

Petrosian, Karpov and Keres all came to the U.S. to play in the San Antonio tourney, (which was rare, but there was a slight hope that Fischer might play in it). Kavalek would have played, but chose preparation for, and the Olympiad instead, maybe not a great choice, but understandable since there was hope Fischer would play on the Olympiad team too!

Kavalek had committed to the Olympiad, thinking that with Fischer possibly on the team, the U.S. had a real shot at a medal. This info. is per one of Kavalek's lectures in the D.C. metro area just a few years ago.

MissScarlett: Shortly after this tournament, on December 12th, a massive simultaneous display took place in the La Salle Hotel in Chicago, featuring the three Soviet players.

The details aren't exactly clear, but a piece by Joel Havemann of the <Chicago Sun-Times Service> in the <Minnesota Star> of December 15th, reports a final score in favour of the Soviet Union of 186-12, suggesting each player faced 66 boards - Karpov drew 3; Petrosian lost 3 and drew 3; Keres lost 5 and drew 2.

Havemann gave his loss to Karpov (sample annotation: <At move 8, Joe Hopkins, a spectator, walks by and says Karpov has put me in a Mroczy [sic] bind. Thanks a lot. Who's Maroczy?>) but the score has a very glaring problem, so the only reliable game I could find is: Keres vs Paul R Little, 1972

Three of Karpov's games (all draws, vs Taylor, Mulberry and Markewycz), apparently from this simul, are in the DB. Did <Chess Life & Review > cover this event?

Troller: <Keres and I started out well, but when I for no reason lost a pawn-up adjournment against him I lost some spirit, and hereafter it almost looked like the oldest participant was going to win. But in the last rounds he played poorly while Portisch pulled out a sprint. Before last round Petrosian and Karpov were half a point ahead of the Hungarian but they offered draws against Suttles and Mecking before the games. Pussies! Maybe too much money was at stake? The first 3 prizes were 4000, 2000 and 1000 dollars, a steep decline. The Russians suggested at the beginning of the tournament to cut 1000 dollars from first prize, add 500 dollars to third prize and distribute the remaining on lower prizes. The organizers were willing, if all players approved. I hurried to protest, I do not like changing the conditions that made me come. Although apart from that, it is true that such a big difference between the main prizes is unusual. (In Hastings 1967-68 the first prize was twice the size of second prize, and fourth prize was almost nothing. It has been suggested with great certainty that the four participating grandmasters were unhappy and from the beginning planned to share first which also succeeded.)>

Olavi: Among professionals in the old days it was agreed that the more the prizes are weighted in favour of the first prize, the more likely one gets lots of ultra short draws, particularly in the last rounds of Opens. This is a given, if you think about it just a little, but somehow organizers and sponsors never seemed to understand.

However it happens in round robins too, off the top of my head I remember this shortie Nunn vs Adams, 1991
in the last round between the leader and the young man half a point behind. And the reason they gave was exactly this: the first prize was very big in proportion, so of course Nunn wouldn't take a risk (even if now Curt Hansen could have caught him), while for Adams, with a loss it would have been peanuts.

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